Tuesday, May 31, 2011

These Are My Famous Last Words...

...set to the tune of Foo Fighters' "Bridge Burning"...

It all comes down to this.

Nineteen weeks of intense training, mental toughness, wanting to quit, and overall work all wrap themselves together to one day. Rev3 Quassy stands but a short few days away.

It's funny, I think that the toughest weeks have been the ones that I have not had intense training. The weeks without big blocks of training have instead allowed me to get into my own head, and I find myself thinking way too much about a whole lot of things.

Have I prepared enough? How fast can I go? What the hell am I thinking? Why am I doing this? I think every athlete goes through this stage of thought process...the nervousness of race day.

To be honest, the toughest part has been thinking about missing my father-in-law, and wishing that he was here to come see things. Although I know he's with me, it doesn't get rid of that selfishness of wanting him along for the ride. Was that messy enough way of saying things? I think it's true, though: I know he's with me, but he's not with me, you know?

At the very least, though, I get to have the wondrous support of Hannah, my lovely wife; my parents; and my extended family will be along for the ride as well. This is going to be a hell of a journey.

This will hurt, it will want to break me. There's no getting around that. But I know I have it in me to race like hell. I will finish with a giant smile on my face. I will be damned happy with what I do. And I'll celebrate for a bit.

Then it's time to get right back down to work, as I've got Timberman on the schedule too. Recovery, followed by good build again.

Will I be competitive? Hell yes. I will carry my ass to the best time that I have within me. Where will that place me? Depends on who shows up on race day. I could be in front, in the middle, hanging off the back end, who knows? All I care about is what I can do.

This is the sign-off for Crashing the Boards until post Rev3. I will have a full race report up next week. Until then, time to crawl back into my headspace, and get ready to race.

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